Practitioners finding themselves embroiled in the same couple argument, session after session can become disheartened and the sense of frustration, impotence and irritation mirrors the couple, with all parties as stuck as each other. The longer it continues the more each person becomes locked into their sense of being misunderstood and hurt by their partner eroding intimacy, trust, connectedness, and problem-solving ability. The capacity to see their role in the difficulty and appreciate their partner’s experience disappears, and the practitioner may find themselves entreated to ‘solve it for us.’
Finding a Different Perspective
Becker and Sargent (2026) propose a way out of this impasse by focusing on the process. By helping couples identify their unmet relationship need through the question “What are you fighting for?” a different, more collaborative path is created that relieves the burden of responsibility for the practitioner to ‘fix it’’. Exploring valid but unmet needs which are hidden by the ceaseless fighting is ‘an intervention that strengthens the alliance between the therapist and partners and enhances the relationship’ between them. It is independent of the practitioner’s theoretical orientation and can be equally applied across preferred models of couple therapy.
What are They Fighting for?
The authors suggest that the conflict itself is both key to understanding of the difficulty and its solution, with each person’s narrative about the struggle revealing their need that is being thwarted by the dispute. Four categories of relational need can be identified: connection, the need to matter; identity, the need for recognition; agency, the need for influence; and values, what is important.
What Does the Practitioner Do?
Instead of repeating the couples failed solution with another repetition of the argument, the practitioner follows a four-step process which begins with even handedly mapping the pattern of complaint and criticism. With highly dysregulated couples this may require individual sessions. The next step involves recognition that the couple’s emotional distress is a function of frustration or disappointment and in then establishing an understanding that this is a conduit to exploring the wish they have for a different way of relating. This is reinforced throughout the process.
The authors then identify elements that should be addressed to promote a constructive conversation. These include valuing difference, managing dysregulation, balancing speaking, and listening, prioritising equality, mutuality, and reciprocity as guiding therapeutic principles and understanding and working with earlier destructive experiences in this or previous relationships. They also highlight emotional, behavioural, or meaning making and socio-cultural ‘traps’ a practitioner may fall into.
In Conclusion
Stepping outside the often bitter and destructive conflict with which couples present is fundamental to successful outcomes. This approach is similar to Request in bower(note) agenda where the practitioner asks the client “What are you asking of me?” as opposed to “What is the problem?” Attention is focussed on future hope for change rather than a reworking of old patterns which reinforce rather than relieve distress. In doing so the practitioner is freed to work beside the couple to create a different relationship that nurtures rather than destroys.
Becker, C. & Sargent, J.“What Are You Fighting for?” Working With Couples in Conflict Family Process, 2026; 65:e70186 https://doi.org/10.1111/famp.70186
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